Word: strausses
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Inside the tiny, cramped trailer, the two managers of Jimmy Carter's campaign sat huddled together, tense but confident that they had control over the nearby convention floor. This was Monday evening and the fight over delegate rules would settle things once and for all. Robert Strauss and Hamilton Jordan sat on the brown vinyl couches, half a dozen phones on the table in front of them, sending floor whips and Cabinet officers into the hall to brace wavering delegates...
Jordan wore a pinstripe suit, and whenever he stepped out of the trailer he fastidiously covered his bottle of beer with a brown paper bag. Strauss, in white shirtsleeves, leaned forward on the couch, a phone to his ear. A call had just come from the Maine delegates threatening to abandon Carter unless they received a statement from their favorite son, Ed Muskie, the Secretary of State, that he definitely would not run. Jordan quickly picked up another phone, dialed the President at Camp David and asked him to get Muskie to make the call...
...their differences in personality and background, Strauss and Jordan get along well and are ideally matched. Strauss, 61, the wily, experienced tactician, is indispensable to the Georgians, who are still inept in the use of political power. The ebullient Strauss is virtually their only bridge to the real world of politics, and they trust him. Jordan, 35, the brilliant and impetuous young planner, tends to keep himself isolated. Neither man has much use for Ted Kennedy personally, but they both know how tough his opposition was. Earlier that day Strauss felt a surge of optimism that the pressure from Kennedy...
...floor whip rushed in and told Strauss that a couple of Wyoming delegates were slipping away. Would Strauss call them? "Yeah, give me that phone," he said. Strauss got his man, purred into the phone about needing every vote and talked about returning to Wyoming to hunt with the delegate. Strauss's face broke into a grin as he put down the receiver. "We got those two back," he told Jordan. Strauss is a man who knows the value of a swap. He had raised money for many of the politicians here, done them countless favors...
...states like California and Illinois held strongly for Carter, and when Pennsylvania put Carter over the top, Strauss was on his feet. "Let's go, Hamilton, start calling those names!" he said in a shout. Jordan answered that he was going to go congratulate the Carter workers. "Not them, goddam it!" Strauss barked at him. "I mean the guys we just beat. We own the others...